Baseball movie review: Milltown Pride

In the spirit of the holiday, I watched a baseball film called Milltown Pride. Produced by Bob Jones University, it is a Christian film with a message that I don’t feel precluded from understanding simply because I am a Jew, so here goes.

There are many good points to the movie. The lessons — the most important aspect of a venture such as this — are good. The production values — the scenery, the music, the costumes — are surprisingly strong. But the writing is trite and cliched in spots, and the baseball action is somewhat phony-looking.

The premise is a young ballplayer, Will Wright (Right?), who is ostensibly a Christian (and I don’t want to get heavy into theology here) growing up in the Prohibition Era South. He loves baseball, much to the chagrin of his upper middle class family, who doesn’t want him associating with the “wrong” (i.e., poor and uneducated) people who work in “the mill.” Nevertheless, his desire to play ball overcomes his upbringing and even his obedience to his folks.

Eventually he grows into strapping young manhood, becoming best friends with a contemporary from the “wrong side,” and moving into town where he hires on at the mill so he can play ball with their team and hopefully catch the eye of a scout. Along the way he becomes enemies with his friend’s brother (I was somewhat troubled by the fact that the “evil” brother is named “Pike,” as in Lipman Pike, the first Jewish pro ballplayer? Or am I reading too much into this? Seems like an amazing coincidence from all the names they could have given him. Just sayin’. And by the way, I can see some non- Christian baseball lovers being a bit discomfited; there’s nothing on the DVD case to indicate the religious content unless the consumer scrupulously scans to the producer (even the use of the word “faith” does not seem to offer full disclosure).

To make a long story short (the movie clocks in at two hours and fifteen minutes), Will struggles to win acceptance from his mill teammates because he does not drink, a promise he made to his parents because an uncle was a drunkard and ended up killing himself. He finally succumbs — how does he know it’s bad unless he tries it — and goes into a downhill spiral, to the disappointment of his family and friends (including a budding relationship with a good woman. And kudos for the producers using Billy Sunday in the story).

[Spoiler alert] Because of his drinking, the team manager suspends hi for the final two games, including the championship. But that doesn’t really matter. Wright accidentally beans Pike’s youngest brother in an altercation between the two feuding athletes — the crucial event that causes him to throw away the bottle and repent. The young boy is in a coma but recovers and asks to see Wright, whom he gives his blessing and forgiveness. But the kid has a relapse, which causes Wright to stay by his side (in full uniform) until he is assured the lad is out of danger. As he rushes out of the hospital, Wright finds his car with four slashed tires, the handiwork of Pike. As Wright runs to the field, he encounters his nemesis on the train trestle, bat in hand. He disarms Pike but does not exact revenge and arrives at the field in the eight inning with his team trailing by two with two outs and a runner –who has just injured himself — on second.

The coach has no choice but to rescind the suspension and use Wright as a pinch-runner. I guess the rules are pretty loose in this league because Wright comes to the plate in the bottom of the ninth with two on and two out, meaning he is the fifth batter, having just been used as a pinch runner in the previous frame, mind you. So what does he do? Do I really have to tell you? This seems like a movie that should have been produced in the 1930s (and probably was).

Actually, having seen the trailer, there are no spoilers.

When I first heard about Milltown Pride, I had visions of a really poor movie from a production point of view. And in many cases, there are indeed issues: aside from the lead roles, the acting comes off a bit wooden if very sincere. The majority of the actors are not professionals, but once you accept that, the performances are praiseworthy for their efforts. Darren Lawson, who plays Wright’s stern father, is academic dean of the School of Fine Arts and Communication at Bob Jones University. Sarah Lawson, who “spends her days teaching the award-winning BJU Press Distance Learning homeschool curriculum,” according to the website, plays the mother. In fact BJU seems to supply many of its people for the film.

I hope I’m not giving off any disrespectful vibes; that’s certainly not my intention. Milltown Pride is not meant to win an Oscar or break box office records and in that, it is a fine film for its purpose: to educate in an entertaining way.

Many thanks to Bill Miller for the loan of the DVD.